My friend tells me that she enjoys my blog. Made my day. I spend a significant amount of time blogging and have been doing so for many years. The work is not onerous but rather fun. I am often lost in the world of writing. Story drives my narrative and compels me to continue. Writing brings me peace. I often wonder if anyone is reading my meager efforts. When I find out that someone is, it is like Christmas. Story is our lives.

It is dry at the ranch after several weeks of rain. The temperature is in the 90s just in time for summer. At last, my yard is all cut at the same time. Yesterday, the 2025 New Year’s Baby happened upon the scene. He will soon be middle-aged. How fast a year passes. We number our days because we only get so many. Those that we receive are precious gifts.

‘The fourth of July is two weeks away,’ Chet said. ‘This year I am erecting a Christmas Tree with firecrackers for ornaments,’ Chet laughed. ‘You realize that after July 4th, the year slips away quickly,’ Chet explained. ‘July is an important month when you return to school in mid-August,’ Chet winked. ‘Sometimes the summer seems like one long weekend,’ Chet mused.

‘I think that it is time for an adventure,’ Jane said. ‘I would like to visit the old church that has been forgotten in the woods,’ Jane’s eyes shone. ‘My great-grandparents were members there and were deacons,’ Jane said. ‘Legend has it that a murder occurred at the Church in the Wildwood, and not long after the event, the doors were locked and the windows shuttered, Jane explained. ‘The organist was killed, and people who have visited the church grounds report that her ghost can be seen walking among the tombstones of former members and that they hear ethereal organ music, Jane said with a shudder. ‘Her name was Annabel Lee, and Edgar Allen Poe wrote a poem about her,’ Jane whispered.

‘It was many and many a year ago, In a kingdom by the sea, That a maiden there lived whom you may know by the name of Annabel Lee.
But we loved with a love that was more than love, I and my Annabel Lee. With a love that the winged seraphs of Heaven coveted her and me. And this was the reason that, long ago, in this kingdom by the sea, a wind blew out of a cloud, chilling my beautiful Annabel Lee.’

Edgar Allen Poe

‘So was not the poem about a woman who lived near the sea and died due to a chilly wind,’ Neva J asked. ‘Or has the story of her death morphed into her being an organist at the Church in the Woods?’ Neva J asked.

‘The ghost that many have seen in the graveyard near the church has told the explorers that she is the Annabel Lee that Poe wrote his poem about,’ Jane explained. ‘The kingdom by the sea is not a literal place, it is fantasy, but Annabel Lee was the Organist at the Church, and it was during the end of Poe’s life,’ Jane answered. ‘Legend has it that during Annabel Lee’s last performance, a man dressed in black with black hair and a mustache sat in the back pew and wept,’ Jane said softly.